Foo Fighters / Social Distortion / The Joy Formidable @ Madison Square Garden 11.13.11

As another year of shows draws to a close, we've come into the habit of enjoying arena rock spectacles as send offs. Last year, Rammstein wowed with their fiery German ridiculousness. In 2011, the Foo Fighters and The Joy Formidable had the charge and delivered outright.

The Joy Formidable opened up the night filthy mouthed and arena-ready with a handful of their heaviest from The Big Roar. The Welsh trio seemed like they were living a dream, rocking out for thousands in a legendary venue -- and expressing their excitement with countless f-bombs in between songs. Their mini-set ended with the fantastic extended version of "Whirring" including massive distortion and  gong bangs. From what seemed the like a million miles away we enjoyed the band from our seats, dreaming of going wild, front row and center during one of their own headlining gigs.

After 45 minutes of lamenting not being more into Social Distortion's rockabilly punk tunes, we were left to survey the masses by which we were surrounded. The immensity of MSG as a full house was astounding and a bit scary, but oddly comforting to be buzzing in anticipation for the biggest rock show of our year.

The fuck all, fun attitude of the night came to fruition with three-hour long performance from the Foo Fighters that went into midnight -- past MSG's 11pm curfew. The dudes made our heads rattle most of the night with a main set of heavy gooduns initiated with "Bridge Burning" and topping it off with "All My Life." The energy in the place was insane but nothing compared to the magic Dave Grohl was putting out. When he wasn't running up and down a catwalk (and most of the main stage) shredding ass, we were treated to our chatty ringleader's famously entertaining banter. Among his many jokes and f-bombs, he advised parents to forget Rock Band and get their kids guitars to write songs like "Monkey Wrench" before ripping into the classic single.

The band made us earn a massive 7-song encore with throat killing screams. Dave Grohl came out alone with guitar in hand, elevating on a platform where he serenaded the upper sections with solo acoustic renditions of the band's softer fare "Wheels," "Best of You." Somewhere in between he challenged us to sing "Wheels" better than German fans (we lost) and vocally agreeing to bring FF to Bowery Ballroom for an epic residency in 2012 (we could only hope this is true).  The concert went straight up next level when Bob Mould joined the Foos for "Dear Rosemary" and surprise guest Joan Jett (!!!!) and the boys powered through a great rendition of "Bad Reputation" before wrapping up the rock n roll shabang with fan favorite "Everlong."

This show boasted the best of an arena rock show short of pyro and spandex -- this is no surprise due to the magnitude of the Foo Fighters' worldwide fame. However, the band accomplished a feat bigger than anything they could've done in their 17 years: make an overblown rock extravaganza simultaneously feel like intimate garage jam sesh. Rich with the analog/garage spirit of Wasting Light, the band us transported to Dave's garage where we enjoyed our pals rock out from couch that can comfortably house about 20,000 people.

Not bad for our first time seeing our (basically) lifelong loves Dave, Nate, Pat, Taylor and Christopher together. --Cheep
Photo by Dana Yavin via BrooklynVegan
For setlist, pics, video of performances with Bob Mould and Joan Jett  check out Brooklynvegan

SBTRKT and Cubic Zirconia @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 11.1.11

Aaaaaaaarooooooooon! and Sampha 

Truth be told, we get blasted into hyperspace quite often at shows. Our addiction to this feeling is what keeps us attending concerts despite ourselves. So after a night of mind-melting dance madness hosted by SBTRKT we had a change of heart: there's no use in planning to skip shows and save money next year.
Hell, we can't even sit out on an opener when planned if the music moves us.

NYC's own Cubic Zirconia's got us up off the floor and shimmying with timbale-happy disco house bangers. Once we caught wind of what was happening on stage, the sassy singer Tiombe Lockhart won our approval. Fearless and sensual, it was difficult to keep your eyes off her. She reminded us of Buraka Som Sistema's resident dancing queen Blaya but left much booty shaking to be desired. We'll chalk it up to her dress being too tight for her to get down harder than she did. Shit did get dark real quick for the last track, a rocking finale with Lockhart rightfully screaming her ass off. It was totally out of left for CZ virgins like ourselves but cool all the same.

Our own cool was lost upon catching the dynamic duo that makes up SBTRKT live set up their stations. Seeing Aaron Jerome and Sampha slay at this summer's MoMA PS1 WarmUp did little to prepare us for the craziness of a proper headlining show. A short set sandwiched between acts in broad daylight was great but there's a different quality to the energy of headlining the night and we couldn't be more psyched about the possibilities.

After a brief introduction from Mr. Jerome, the guys went head first into "Heatwave" while we plunged into insanity from the sound. The sold-out crowd moved to tricked out versions of songs from SBTRKT's out-of-this-world self titled debut. Sampha's sweet yet melancholy honey-rich voice got the best of us during "Trails of the Past" and "Something Goes Right," grooving as we wept inside. The particularly awesome Drake mix of "Wildfire" and a sick extended mix of our favorite "Pharaohs" (which they didn't play the first time we saw them) were no cause for tears but a dream come true, it was absolutely mental. Also thrown in the loop was new-to-our-ears title track from the equally euphoric Step in Shadows EP. I kicked myself after listening to this live since the EP has been sitting in my computer for weeks, untouched. Currently it's all I listen to. Snail said it's better we didn't listen to the EP before or we'd whine about how they didn't play more of it. She had a point.

All night, Aaron jumped from drums to theremin to mixers and laptop like a mad scientist, frenetically fetching the right test tubes for this surreal dance experiment he and Sampha were conducting on the audience. The result was a hallucinogenic experience that left us all crazy for more. After a stunning encore with "Never, Never" and a purchasing of the vinyl, we left on a high. Refusing to believe it was over we were forced to ask "Where's the afterparty?" To our delight they're to return for Phase II of the experiment in March and we're counting the days! --Cheep

Photo from SBTRKT's Seattle date by David Lichterman

Cold Cave/Austra/Cult of Youth @ Bowery Ballroom 8.6.11

Photo by Dominick Mastrangelo via BrooklynVegan

We constantly dream how it would've been to see the likes of Depeche Mode, Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees, Joy Division, New Order, Bauhaus and the Cure when they were young, inciting new wave dancey parties live in clubs and special to small group of romantic, dark and lonely weirdos. Literally babies then, we missed the boat and have been looking for the new wave dance party of our dreams ever since this music came into our line of hearing. Once upon a time, we had it in The Faint but their absence has left us thirsty. On this particular Saturday night libations flowed for what seemed forever with Austra and Cold Cave and we drank furiously.

Among the gays, girls, goths and everything inside and between, we stood on the floor, coming in during the last of Cult of Youth's loud yelps and fiddledidoos. Our brains were programmed for danceable electronics on this night so we dismissed them and their lack thereof accordingly. We soon fell out of attack mode with Austra's appearance -- or rather performance.

The band -- with the exception of harness booted keyboardist Ryan Wosniak -- walked on stage looking like the ultimate hipster caricatures. As it was the last day of tour, they threw together the last random bits of clothing they had left into less than stellar outfits. While their wardrobe choices were questionable, they hit the mark where it counts the most, musically. Singer Kate Stelmanis' has cemented herself as unique voice in indie with her fragile coos. In combination with the voices of Sari and Romy Lightman, the ladies sound like a chorus of wounded birds singing themselves into oblivion, tragic yet beautiful.

Bassist Dorian Wolf and drummer Maya Postepski add a new and welcome oomph to the set electro beats of the better songs off the Canadian band's debut Feel It Break. "Darken Her Horse," "Lose It" "Spellwork," "The Villain," and "Beat and the Pulse." Some may say "Lose It" is the single that made them but I offer up the sonically perfect and instantly contagious "Beat and The Pulse." You have to be soulless to not move to this joint.

In addition to the familar, they performed two songs we'd never heard, "Young and Gay" from the Beat and the Pulse EP and the unreleased "Habitat" our ears and feet quickly embraced them both happily.

At the end of their set, we had a decision to make: to stay or not to stay. Aside from a quick listen to Cherish the Light Years days before the show, we knew nothing of Cold Cave except that there was the potential danceyness to ensue. In the ever-present spirit of no regret, we vowed to stay on hopes of having a great time and if shit got boring, we'd leave and get some bubble tea at Just Sweet.

As usual we can't plan anything because it always ends up out window. Cold Cave had us the second they hit the stage after the shortest wait in between bands known to us. Into the darkness came drummer Alex Garcia-Rivera, singer Wes Einsold and synthesizer-er Ian Dominick Fernow, the latter two wearing the best leather jackets we'd ever laid our unworthy eyes on. Einsold intiated the set with a throwing of sunflowers into the crowd of which we were two of the lucky recipients. Then the music hit us.

It came in like the firestorm of Sarah Connor's dream, blowing away every layer of human leaving only our bare bones intact holding onto the lip of the stage. Two songs in and I thought we'd found our new The Faint. This was new wave party we've been dying to attend -- only we thought more people would be dancing instead of standing around oogling at the stage. We did our thing as hard as we could but it was nothing close to Fernow's moves. He thrashed about the stage, his body with no choice but to exorcise the abundance of energy and anguish and angst in this way. It was focan inspiring.

The band proved their worth and our brain signaled GET $5 DOLLAR BAND SHIRTS NOW! and during a slow jam we gave up front spots to venture out to the merch table and get what we wanted -- well, "needed" at this point. Unfortunately, the merch dude was away and would be back after their set so we went back inside danced to the encore in the back where the sound was better but it hurt to watch so many people not moving.

The second Wes uttered "This is our last song," we timed it so we'd head down toward the middle of it. We got our stuff and left, their hour long set leaving us enough time to still make it to Just Sweet for a bubble tea fix. Sipping on our iced teas with lychee jelly in awe of the night's happenings, we thanked the sons and daughters of 80s new wave for giving us something new to dance to.

Setlist and pics over at BrooklynVegan